Cynthia
by darkchashy
Summary: A story running adjacent to Kain's rise to power involving a girl who must find a way to survive it or deride it.
1. Default Chapter Title

Cynthia of the house of Brinflick was facing the fact that she was in hard times. It had been four hundred years since the dark lord Kain had surfaced in the land of Nosgoth. It was believed for the first few years that the undead creature would simply fall pray to the vampire hunters. But, by the hundred year anniversary of the organization of Kain's armies, they were celebrating in Coorhagen square on a stage of thousands of dead mortal bodies. Half of these bodies would rise up to be soulless suckers of blood. Since then almost all the major cities had been destroyed and the citizens either murdered or scattered all over the lands. 

The Brinflick camp was one of the largest of these camps. Defying the vampires of their horrendous interpretations of humans as cattle. The Brinflick and others of the fleetingly small groups of human survivors attacked The vampires caravans during the day and often averaged four to six vampires each trip. Whilst the vampires often take ten times that number on just the human attacks, not counting the lone vampires that wandered into known human territory and took as they pleased or counting the recent all-out attacks on the humans.

But, what was a mortal to do? 

Cynthia was in the schooling tent three hours before her family and home was slaughtered, learning the intricacies of math along with her other peers. All of which she knew well at the time. Mathew Willard, Rumored to be the last living descendant of the town Steinchincoe. Crelia Funior, who's great grandfather had escaped from a human 'storage dungeon', Lydia Lefual; who was new to the camp as was her mother after they escaped her family's fate of slaughter and soul stealing. Death was not a new thing to the camp. Not a new thing at all.

"Lydia! That's four bobbles, not three." The teacher Emelia Rineos Lefual sneered at her daughter. Who was anything but the teachers pet, if she knew what was good for her.

"Yes mother." She replied .Quickly rectifying her mistake. Cynthia paid little attention to this drama.

"Teacher, may I relieve myself?" Willard asked. 

Rineos Sneered once more. "Yes dear, you may. But be less descriptive and ask if you may be excused." "Yes ma'am." He said and walked out of the tent for the last time.

The room was silent once again save for the soft clicking sound of the counting bobbles against each other and the quite murmur of the calculating student. The majority of the class was ten to fourteen year old with education's that were usually far below the former standard classes of old. Cynthia was special in that she was 16 and far above the usual capacity of intelligence. She about to become a great deal more special.

"

Class, dismissed." The teacher indifferently exclaimed. waving the students off with an almost uncaring turning of the wrist. The students rose saying in a loud whisper of unison "yes, ma'am." Being excused from a class brought no joy to the children in this world, nothing did it seemed.

It was dark outside, Cynthia realized, almost immediately wiping the soot from her dress. it always seemed to be dark for the last couple of weeks. A thick layer of smoke was being constantly belched from factories deep inside the vampire territory. Rumor was that the vampires were running the factories solely for the purpose of blocking out the sun. The adults however, assured Cynthia that this was a ridiculous assumption.

Adult, Cynthia chuckled. She was after all, sixteen. Well, far from the childhood of her other class mates and surely at her intellectual peak never minding her senior's request that she be more modest. There would be other things to learn, no doubt. But, she already knew the basics. Kill vampires with sharp stakes and holy water. Hunt in the day for food, never wander during night and....

The scream that changed Cynthia's life belonged toWillard, as did the blood that sprayed on Lydia from behind a nearby tree, Lydia screamed, a picture of womanly vanity marred by war. Cynthia took the small vial of water she kept in her blouse and ran to Lydia who continued to scream potrusively. Let your aim be true. She told herself, for your soul's sake. When Cynthia saw the vampire, she nearly lost her nerve. It was bald, covered in Willard's blood and sneering like the demon from hell that it was, at little Lydia. Willard lay at it's feet, almost an unrecognizable pile of flesh and blood. The vampire turned toward Cynthia's direction saw her and smiled ignoring Lydia for the time being. Cynthia's blood ran cold.

It'll run all over the ground for surely if you don't get your act together. Cynthia balled up her fist and threw the vial.

The vampire caught it in his hand, more or less. It broke and splattered all over it's pale flesh, the palm became a pool of red. The vampire screamed horribly as it clenched it's disintegrating hand.

"Damn wench!!" It screamed. "You shall pay for this with your sweet blood." The abomination rushed at Cynthia quite literally walking over Lydia. Cynthia could hear her bones crunch under the things heavy black boots. Now that it stepped out of the shadowy woods, Cynthia could see that it was far taller then 8 feet and was dressed in what looked like a black mockery of a preachers robe. Cynthia, knew it was worthless to run so she settled for Lydia's approach and screamed. "Damn screaming wench!" The vampire cried again. "Kain forever!"

"Kain dead!" The voice of Cynthia's father cried and an arrow sailed through the air to nest it's self in the vampires ear and poke out the other like some obscene jester's trick. "AAAARGH!" it yelled tugging the arrow out with one swift ripping movement of it's talon-like arms. It look to it's left and Cynthia ran before her father could even shout at her to do so. She never saw the outcome, but she felt she knew already her fathers fate. Shame was a strong thing. But even the strongest among us at so young an age cannot deny fear.

She ran back to the school tent and turned back almost immediately fighting back both the tears and the revulsion. In front of the school tent were three vampires, crouching over the remains of Rhinoa. The one holding her head turned and saw Cynthia just as she disappeared into the forest. He looked to his companion. "You see that?" He asked.

His companion frowned at him in between gulps of the blood flowing into his mouth through thin air from the corpse. "I didn't have to." He replied. "Go head. I'll find another one."

" Be careful." said the vampire, dropping the decapitated skull to the ground, his companion gave a mocking laugh and then the other began a transformation that was so mundane to the vampire yet so horrifying to the humans. He then ran toward Cynthia, following her scent.

Cynthia didn't have to get but fifteen feet from the main tents to know that the forest around them was ablaze with fire. her cloths were singeing from the heat and the skin on her face seemed to be roasting. The woods were barely perceptible in broad date day light by themselves and the smoke helped none. Cynthia couldn't see save for the bright flame, if she should walk into this wall of flame before she gained her ability to judge distance again. Well, that was fate. 

And as fate would have it she broke into the clearing where once there was no clearing. The ground was soft and brown in front of her and filled with holes. The vampire must have planned, she thought briefly. Dug deep into the ground beneath the warning guards and risen up for the slaughter. The possibility of casualties would be less severe that way. They knew where we were all this time, letting us be only while they planned for our demise. How they must play with us. 

Cynthia was suddenly robbed of her thought when she was sprayed in blood and various parts of the human anatomy. The vampires had pulled all the trees out, displaying all the huts and tents for all the stars of the sky to see. It almost looked like an actual village now. Save for the vampires setting them ablaze and killing anything that dared breath. Blood and bodies littered the soil.

"NO!" Cynthia screamed, pulling out her silver dagger. They were dead, all of them, she was the last. No doubt she was the last and what casualties did they have to show for it. Nothing, save for a miserable nosferatus hand, which would no doubt grow back within a week, a week, ha! More like seconds. She would have to do something about that. She approached the nearest vampire, screaming. The vampire appeared to be a man slightly older then Cynthia. skin pale with hair black as a coma. Unlike the others this one had an ornate cloth hanging from one shoulder baring the insignia of the vampire Raziel. The vampire around him seemed to be chuckling and laughing at this pitiful effort of retribution and revenge. The vampire himself displayed an air of indifferent readiness. 

Something pounced on Cynthia from the back with furry paws and razor claws that dug deep into her shoulder to poke out in her chest. Cynthia's screams of rage turned to pain, yet she held fast to her dagger. She went down and stabbed the knife into the soft dirt much as the vampire wolf had dug into her shoulders with its claws. For a moment, it all went dark then white with pain.

It's over, she thought, over. Despite her opinion, her reflexes thought otherwise. She brought her dagger up and with one swift movement whirled it over in her hand and stabbed it into the meaty forearm of the wolf and twisted. Reaction was almost instantaneous.

The thing brought it's claws up from Cynthia's shoulders, ripping its wound even wider until it seemed almost the entire bunch of muscles dangled from it. It howled in agony and began staggering around the burning landscape.

Good, She thought. Now get up and kill that bloodsucking bastard that killed everything you know. She did as fast as her wounds would allow, which was less then swift. She looked forward to see that her first targets were still standing before her. Some still held mirthful smiles on their pallid mugs, visibly amused. Others seemed enraged at her terrible aggression. The one in the middle. Who seemed to be a commander of some kind, remained stoic (The vampire Raziel himself? surely not) . behind her the howls were turning into screams of rage. If she was quick enough, she could shove the blade into its heart while it was still morphing.

She stood and staggered around to face her attacker. Indeed, he was in mid-change. His face losing it's snout and profuse hair. His cloths seemingly were materializing out of no where. Cynthia gripped her dagger in both hands and raised it over her head. ignoring the screaming wound in her shoulder and emitting a war cry that all her future compatriots would later remark, rivaled the call of a thousand demons. She rushed forward and was pleased to see a look of pure horror in the helpless vampire as his immortality was threatened.

A golden blade cut through Cynthia's legs like butter at the knees and they toppled to the ground. But it was too late. As she went down, the blade went through the vampires over-shirt at a downward angle straight into its heart. First blood came from the wound. then it a cloudy black iqor that rivaled darkness itself. Cynthia looked straight into the creatures eyes for a moment, then spit in its face as she let go of the knife. Dropping to the ground. The vampire staggered backward screaming for a few seconds then its legs exploded in an orange flash, followed by its torso and chest and so forth. The dagger flew out of it's purchase and found another one inches from Cynthia's face in the ground. 

To bad it didn't land in my throat. She thought. It would have been the perfect end to a hell of a day. She pushed herself upward with her palms and arched her neck to look at her assailants in a strange panorama around her. The Commander was standing to her left and holding the golden blade, it's squared edge dripping with her own blood. The vampire glowered at her and she could see through her light-headedness that the others had similarly lost their amused demeanor. She however, gave them a cheerful smile. She would kill them all if she could, But this was not to be. But she had killed one. Which were more then some of the fiercest human warriors could say. 

"I hope you choke on my blood." She croaked as the world began to fade. They began to growl and ball up their fist. She was about to ready her available saliva to spit on one of then when the golden blade swiped just under her chin and lobbed her head off with a cleanness that was matched only by the flesh of a vampire.

For a moment, her body sat erect like a sphinx, her neck spouting with blood. Then she collapsed on the ground in a jumbled heap. She was dead.

"Wench killed Jasper." Cooper sneered, looking to Raziel "God, what a waste." Raziel only grimaced at the girl. he hadn't cared for Jasper. He'd been a stupid one anyway. What Raziel cared about was the dead, discombobulated girl lying in pieces on the ground. Some of her blood stained his robe, he opened his mouth and the blood floated into it. He let the sweat life necessity flow down his throat. He was surprised, it didn't really taste tainted at all. Whatever this girl's lineage was, it was pure.

Raziel looked up at his companions and sneered at their impatient pale faces which seemed to be urging him to let them go back. " Regail, you and Cooper take the East Side of the forest." he ordered, not moving from his spot. " Snerik, You and Bach take the west and look for survivors, come back at dawn. No earlier" the underlings irked at this and Bach, always a hot head looked on the verge of jumping him. Not that he would. Bach wasn't stupid

"Go! damn your eyes." Raziel yelled and at this first sight of temper the group was off. Some flying away as a dreaded night creature or scurrying off as furry four legged demons that some poor fools mistake for bats or wolves. As Bach flew over-head Raziel snatched him out of the air and flung him onto a nearby rock were he bounced off to land on the girl, prompting a loud screech from the creature as it squirmed and writhed on the corpse. The creature all the while seemed to unfold into a more human form , until Bach was fully whole and sneering up at his master.

Raziel stood stoic through all this, he pointed at the body, then pointed with the other hand to the girl's head. Which had caught fire by this time. "Take her." He said "her blood is pure and she fought well, despite her deed."

Bach growled at this and protested " You think to give an enemy forever and expect it to bow before you! Surely you jest lord Raziel! Surely!" Bach began to stand but a hard pale hand swiped at his skull like a blade, had Bach been human, he would have been torn of the same appendage as the girl he fell back onto.

"You know not to question me." Raziel casually remarked as he reached for his belt. "Now do it and give her body to the wall builders." He crushed something in his hand and without anymore do warning the creature that had once been a prince before his 'father' revoked the title to make him lieutenant; vanished into a cloud of mist that floated into the forest. One by one the other vampires followed taking whatever booty they wished. Some dragged along dead girls that they would turn to make their brides, while others took weapons of grandeur found gripped in some mortals dead hands. Bach continued to sit on the dead girl until the only thing that surrounded him were the burning woods, he beckoned the skull, which by now was almost completely burnt to the bone. Still the remaining blood in it was still potent enough to make it careen through the air into his hands. Bach sneered at the skull as he bit into his tongue and let the blood drip into the gaping jaws. He chanted ancient words he knew only from his corrupt heart and plunged his hand into the corpse's chest, bring out her heart and raising it over his head then dropping it into his mouth. The burning fire seemed to be dulling suddenly and Bach had the feeling of being sucked into a large black hole in his soul. A feeling he had only experienced three time before when as a foolish new-born ( Though being turned could hardly be described as being born, more like dying a hundred times over.) He had turned his mother, father and sister. Both parents went almost completely insane while his sister had tried to kill him. Bach hadn't tried it since. He tried now.

Suddenly the darkness took shape....

To become a strange black rock that she was hanging over by mer inches. Her hands were bound with chains over her head and the chains ascended into the above blackness with no viewable purchase. Though Cynthia guessed that it was connected to the pillar a few yards away that was doing like wise with the chain. She was wearing her school dress as usual, but it was ripped to tatters and seemed almost singed to ashes and her feet were bare. The rock was surrounded by red hot brimstone that scorched it into blackness. Cynthia couldn't remember how she got here, though she guessed the vampires had knocked her unconscious and had dragged her here to be interrogated. But she didn't feel that was quite right. The fact was, nothing seemed right. Her body seemed to be enveloped with a burning sting and she winced at its pain, though she did not scream, for if this was an interrogation, that would make it even worse.

But deep down inside her. she knew this was no interrogation. Deep down inside, she knew this was something worse.

Far worse.

She tried squirming her wrist to get out of the shackles but they almost seemed grafted to her skin. She bobbed up and down , but the chain was firmly attached to whatever it was that loomed above her, then she felt around the shackles for a lock that she might be able to pick some how. But she felt none. All this while the pain seemed to increase. Finally she went limp and began to sob, only she could not feel any wetness fall from her eyes. the feeling that something was desperately hopelessly wrong keep eating away from her, To make things worse, she couldn't tell what that damned pain was. It was unbearable and she couldn't stop it. "Oh God!" She screamed "Oh God Oh God, Please help me! Oh God! Oh God! Oh God!" 

"No, No God, No God." A voice answered, echoing into and out of the darkness. Cynthia tightened whirling around on her chain to survey the emptiness to only see more darkness. She was not alone, she readied her legs to grab at whatever tried to approach her. Though if it was a vampire she might as well be trying to strangle yonder pillar.

"No God, No God, No God for you my lady." The voice erupted in cackles and from its strange empty quality Cynthia demised that it defiantly wasn't human. Still, if it wished to take her life, it would have to earn it. Cynthia began to scream. 

"Come on out you bastard! Come and take me if you can!" The creature responded with even more hysterical cackling and Cynthia began to prepare a vile amount of phlegm in her mouth for when she should greet this new nemesis of hers.

Only she couldn't feel any phlegm in her mouth, her pallet seemed as dry as a desert and horribly rough. Cynthia growled in anger at this. surely this monster had put some terrible spell on her, no doubt to make her desperate with thirst and hunger till she gave out some vital bit of information that they needed. though she had never heard of such a spell. But if not a spell then what...

It became clear, and Cynthia could feel her unbeating heart freeze. "No..." She murmured "No!No! No! Leave me die in peace you bastard!" 

The voice answered and Cynthia could somehow feel it sneering. "If it had been up to me 'Madam' I would have gladly done so and left you to your powerless god" It chuckled and a figure materialized in front of Cynthia, she tried to hold in the scream, but to no advail. She suddenly remembered everything. They hadn't knocked her on conscious, and they weren't interrogating her. They were damning her as they were damned. Cursed to walk the earth forever in hell, with only killing to sustain her. In the demons hand he held a severed head with a collar around its neck, nearly burnt to an unrecognizable ball of ash. He passed his hand over it and it suddenly turned a truly ashen white bone, then to flesh, then it sprouted sandy red hair that was far straighter then anything Cynthia had ever been able to manage. The flesh clear and white and yet so rotted and vile. Take a good look, she told herself. Because your never to see that face in a mirror staring back at you again.

"Cynthia shook her head and saw to her horror that the thing in the creatures hand was doing like wise as he floated toward her. "Please" She pleaded "Please don't do this thing, please." It mimed her words with its mouth and Cynthia felt her stomach churn.

The abomination called Bach, sneered at the dead mortal called Cynthia. "Take it and quit your damned groveling, you'll be doing enough of that when your turned." He held out the skull eye to eye with Cynthia and she tried to turn away from it.

Its eyes flung open and they were her eyes, in that she could see through them but they were not really hers in truth. They were cats eyes, orange and menacing. It opened its mouth in a leering fanged grin. "Join me." It said.

Cynthia screamed with her own voice for the last time.


	2. The death birth

Chapter 1

The thing opened its eyes. Glowing orange and seemingly burning with a strange fire. Yet even despite the roaring hunger behind them, the eyes were speckled with fear. It couldn't move, it could not discern what it was seeing, strange white sticks and spikes jutting out in all directions seemed to surround it, tubes they seemed. It screamed and further frightened itself by the strange roar that came out of it. This was not right. It struggled and thrashed within the strange prison, smashing anything it saw with terrifying ease. Although it sensed that everything around it was completely dark, it could see almost perfectly through a strange orange tint that was unusual to it though the creature did not question it. The thing was too hungry to question it. To terribly hungry and it didn't know what it was hungry for.

No, No that wasn't true, it realized. It knew what it wanted and it knew, suddenly knew and remembered why. The thing let out a loud inhuman sob. It wanted blood and it wanted it badly.

Cynthia roared again, her memory flooding back in a painful wash. She knew who she was and she knew the hunger that she had would not simply go away nor could she rely on starvation. Once maybe, but not since Kain had acquired a relic known as the eternal black heart, which safe guarded his brood and therefore the entire vampire race from starvation. She knew the most difficult thing most of all though. She knew she was damned. Damned to hell because of what she was. Where she was no longer was important. What was important to her now was to get out, walk into the nearest human village and let them kill her, except she knew it wasn't that simple. She could feel it in her. A strange demon that would not let her die if she could help it. If she did do such a thing, she would no doubt take a few innocents with her. But she would die. There was nothing in this world that would keep her in this damned soulless orb. Be it Demon or other wise.

She began to smash the strange white small columns with such force, as she never thought she would ever posses. They broke apart like dust around her and despite the splintering pieces that flew everywhere she felt not a prick on her. The one thing her father always warned her of vampires was to never go up against one relying on your own foolish brute strength. Something she never thought she possessed in the first place.Thinking of her father, she imagined what he might think of such a predicament as hers. She decided to give both her and her father a little peace and not.

For countless hours she bashed against her strange cage seemingly in vain only to have more white dusty sticks fall around her. After about the second hour she decided that she knew what the sticks were, thousands upon thousands of bones. She didn't know how long she had been gone. The vampires had apparently gotten to the point where the storage of the human remains was becoming a problem; she guessed that much. But had her corpse been numbered among these dead, but of course my oh so foolish daughter, her some time taunting father would have said. She could imagine others like her, eventually breaking the surface like maggots from their eggs or mosquitoes, rising from the pond into the morning air. More charming still.

When she did eventually break surface she found herself jutting like a ship's head staff out of the side of a great bone wall. That's what it was yes, a wall. One larger then she had ever seen or ever wanted to see. She looked up and the bone wall seemed to careen into the sky. Past the clouds, seeming to pass the stars themselves. It was remarkable. She looked down, but the wall was completely shrouded in mist. Not clouds as she had thought, mist. Left, right, up, down. She had some seemingly inborn instinct in her that told her bearings like some demon compass, otherwise she would have had absolutely no idea which way she was facing, much less her bearings. She could have been hanging upside down for all she knew.

She smashed her fist into the wall at either side of her and thrust her self out of the hole she had made. She expected to fall downward. (Maybe piercing my heart on some nice Yale wood trees) She thought amusedly. But, instead she planted her feet on opposite sides of the hole (her feet were bear except for strange metal sandals of some sort and crunched onto the bone walls with out so much as a drop of blood.) She looked down amusedly into the hole. It seemed black and empty at first, then Cynthia's vision took on a strange orange quality again and she could see the jagged circler walls inside the blackness caked in a fuzzy white powder of old fragile disintegrated bone. She smiled. Not knowing why, but thinking of a small hole leading to a very dark hell that she would have preferred to this. She considered leaping back in and laughing all the way down, and didn't. 

Instead she did a grace full turn to look downward, into the cloaking mists. Darkness of course. It all was darkness now and would be forever. She tried to cry and couldn't

She wondered briefly if she would go down there and kill every vampire on that damned world below her and decided she wouldn't.

Some, but not all. Kain. The one known as Kain would die, she was sure of that. Kain forever. The vampire had said and Kain dead, Her father had said. 

She licked her teeth, feeling the curve of two sharp canines that were far beyond abnormal. Licking them made the hunger worse. With a little fear, dread, and anticipation all together, she wondered if she would take human life. 

She decided that she couldn't, wouldn't. But, she had to. 

2

Tawnia of the house of servitude decided that all and all. She was a lot better off them most of her species. She cleaned the rooms, delivered small goods and did other such chores with out any threat of being killed or maimed, if she was, the house of Bach would most certainly declare a war for the damage of human goods. There seemed to be a lot of wars lately between the vampires, lately her grandmother told her with a smile, as in the last hundred years. Clans would have civil wars, sometimes breaking up into three different houses, which would continue on killing each other until the high clans ordered them to reunite or all suffer annihilation, the humans were usually left unharmed through out, unless someone forgot to feed them or unless the war was specifically about them, Bach the high clan vampire was in such a war right now and after an extensive three year civil war (Quite brief really, her mother has said, Though some vampire wars went on for centuries, Lord Kain rarely lets any of his clan revolt for very long) half of Bach's clan had removed themselves from him and brought his high class standing in a dreadful peril. Often times he could be seen fuming over his ill fortune at his supper or shouting ignobly at his advisors who assured him that technically they weren't really demoted to being a house yet and that a little war would have his clan leadership back in full. That is, if Raziel would allow it. Tawnia was thirteen and found the hierarchy of the vampire politics fascinating. She herself could not wait to become one of the undead. To be able to live in splendor and improve her ranks by her own deeds of conquest. She could see it now, for truly all she had to do was raise a house, serve Kain and seek far off places that would be easily expanded into Nosgoth's empire. The fact that this would take the death of humans to do so did not bother her. Most humans beyond Nosgoth were miserable creatures anyway as the smoke that went forth from the sun pillars (or sun smighters as they are more popularly known) fell upon Nosgoth's neighboring lands and killed or mutated anything it's radiation touched. So were the wastelands of Nosgoth born and so were the humans of the land doomed.

Yes, Tawnia felt very fortunate to be a vampire worshippers daughter indeed, very fortunate. So much that her step became lighter and she exerted childish giggles into the ancient mystic air of the Nosgoth death wall, a wall of pure human bones. Piled up over centuries of feeding, after all the grounds of Nosgoth had seemed littered completely with jagged white twigs and the humans often tripped upon them and fell on the half buried bones. The wall had been set up as a sort of barrier from the outside world, where it was said, that the humans had made great (And dangerous) technological advances to deal with the vampire threat destroying the land.

Tawnia frowned, and her cheerful demeanor dropped as she looked up the seemingly endless wall. Every now and again she would see a hole in the wall, where some newborn vampire had burst through into the world. It was generally a good idea for a worshipper (Or any other human for that matter) To stay clear of the wall. Often times when a vampire first comes into the world, they are unaware of the rules of the vampire clans pertaining to the human servants and their meager value. Or they are simply so hungry that thy do not care and every so often one hears of the 'accidental' death of a human worshipper to a newborn vampire. Afterwards the vampire is brought to the owner of that human, who then decided the penalty for the loss of property. Such cattle our we, Tawnia thought, I should have to work diligent so that I may trade this weak flesh in for a paler sort. Forgetting once again of the potential danger lurking in the wall, she began to hum a tune, some old ballad or rather, written by the great vampire composer Goloc. She much admired the music of the undead and it's strange sadness. She walked further up the path of the wall, not seeing a faintly glowing set of eyes leer at her from directly above her head.

Sadness that was what Cynthia Brinflick felt as she came nearer to the girl, and a slowly diminishing grasp of humanity. Then the Cynthia, who would have gladly traded the girl what she had and didn't want with what Cynthia herself had and didn't want, approached her first prey.

The hall was lighted in several odd corners. Burning torches sat on the ground and hung from the walls with no regard for structure or alignment. The vampires didn't need the light, but it keep the human servants warm so that they could perform their duty more productively and to keep them healthy in case consumption become necessary as punishment and as many of the aging, lazy and rebellious among the humans knew, supper was coming. Vampires lined the walls doing nothing in particular besides be there. Bach sat at the end, on a rudimentary throne made of wood that faintly resembled that of Kain, through no lack of trying by the human wood workers. Vainly hoping that their craft would save their poor short life. Adorning the throne on all sides were various groveling advisors, discussing, contemplating, oblivious to the fact that Bach was not listening, did in fact, appear to be dosing. His legs crossed, head resting on his closed fist. Engraved on his chest plate armor was the mark of the Raziel clan. Adorning the halls was the same insignia, hanging on bloody banners, which over the centuries had became crusty banners. The building had once been an Abbey. When it was fresh, Bach had been quite taken by it's beauty, but now the walls were mere skeletons of it's previous self and the high towers lay buried in the snow where they had fallen. It very well analogized Bach's small empire, now ruined and shortened by half of his former subjects. He had tried to approve a war to lord Raziel, but the sniveling vermin had only declared themselves independent to Bach and still pledged allegiance as Raziel's brood. Thus Raziel had only resources to lose from further war and forbid Bach any sort of conflict, unless the successioned half were to attack him and that would only be in defense, there were to be no counter attacks. Bach was going insane with rage more often then not these days whenever some small matter complicated his life now and when some cretin was accused of some crime or another, Bach was more them happy to inflict the punishment himself. He enjoyed it in fact.

So when he saw two figures dragging a kicking howling woman figure towards his presence, he stood at attention, causing his advisors (Some of which, were actually human) to go silent. The creatures lining the hall forgot what they were or were not doing and watched anxiously as the three approached the master. Bach enjoyed this as much as they did and killing a stupid fledgling (For the scent of this one, even from this distance was incredibly young) sounded like a lovely way to start a young evening. 

What would he do to this one? Crush its head in? Hang it on the wall to starve for years before killing it when it's shrieks became annoying, or shredding to pieces with his bare hands. He could hardly wait.

God, eternity was boring. Bach groaned and put the thought aside; a little variety was better then none at all.

" Bastards!" The figure roared, as it tried to twist from the bone yard wall guards. For that was what they were. Bach sneered, no wonder this one smelled so young. He could no doubt take a guess what her crime was as well. Ah well, one less mortal mouth to muffle with muffins as the old poets said. Bach signaled for his cloak with a snap of his fingers and in an impressive swoop from the church's crumbling rafters, two bats came down with the cloak in their talons. As they veered upward they dropped the heavy cloth on his shoulders, a servant boy then walked up behind Bach bearing a stepladder. The boy leaned it against Bach's back and climbed up it. Then, reaching across Bach's neck, clasp together the throat bands to secure the cloak. The servant boy then jumped off, grabbed his ladder and was gone. Bach had once prepared the display for a rare visit from Kain. He had meant it to display his power, but Kain had only laughed. Still Bach insisted that the ritual be performed on a regular basis. If anything for his ego to heal from Kain's verbal beating and because Lord Raziel (Though Bach would never admit it) hated it.

The woman creature didn't seem to care for it either. Not that she really saw it. She was making her own display of power against the guards. She had flexed her left arm straight and pulled it out of the left guard's grasp. She then punched the one on her right and caved in its skull. The vampire screamed and let go, clutching at it's healing face. Damn Melchaih spawn isn't worth the rotting bodies they inhabit Bach thought angrily. The other though was one of Dumah's, he backed away from the girl wisely instead of lunging at her, which would have earned him a nice place in hell. The woman whirled swirling the cloth of her fledgling dress, a dress that was simple yet noble, black and bearing her shoulders which (Of course, thought Bach drearily) was white as snow and as wrong as acid water. Upon her shoulders sat fine silk locks of red hair, which surrounded a rather fair face, even for a vampire. Though Bach had taken so many women to his bed. (Vampire and mortal) He was really rather indifferent (Well, not actually indifferent, but he had enjoy the occasional bed romp a lot more three hundred years ago then he did in the present).

The woman did not shrink from the Dumah soldier as many others did before one. Instead, she screamed at him in advance. The Dumah went to swipe at the foolish charge, but the girl juked to the right, swiped with her hand and took off a large chunk of the Dumah's shoulder. He screamed in rage and spun around, clawing the air in the girl's absence. The girl turned, her face a beautiful mask of mad rage. She crouched, ready for the Dumah's attack.

Bach smiled, this might get interesting.

The Dumah made to flank to the right, then flat-out charged to the left and right angling toward the girl. The girl glided to her own right and the Dumah flew past. Then this fledgling, which fought like an elder god, reached behind her almost casually and clawed at the Dumah, thrusting her arm into his back. She dug her feat into the ground while the Dumah sustained his forward motion. Leaving the girl with it's pulsing heart in her grasp.

The Dumah turned around, fear in its eyes for the first time. But it knew no hesitation as it charged once again. The girl did not try to avoid it, she only tossed the beating heart into a nearby torch where it nestled like some tumorous egg in a phoenix nest. Instantly the Dumah ignited and as it fell upon the new arrival, it blew apart on contact, throwing the girl back into the wall. She only took a moment to recover but she might as well have had the whole day. The spectators to this unannounced event only stared in great amusement as the girl stood, taking a dropped silver stake from the ground. Not even Bach moved.

She stood at the ready for an attack and when none came, Bach looked to the melchiah spawn, who only now was fully healed and feeling the stolen and ruined human flesh around his face (which of course, healed not at all) Bach pointed at him sneering and waved at him to advance the girl. The melchiah frowned, pointed at the symbol carved into his shoulder to show (As if Bach was blind) That he was not part of the Raziel brood (He was, however, a traitor to his own brood and was therefore little consequence to anyone, let alone Bach. He growled menacingly to the soldier for him to attack, At last he did. Simply running toward the girl like a lamb to the slaughter and the girl treated him as such, shoving the staff into his eye and twisting his head off. She kicked over the vampire's shins and brought the body to the ground, then continued to stab at the body till it resembled some strange sort of blood meal all while the head watched from the spears hilt, she then threw the whole melchiah mess into the flames of his compatriot where it screeched in pain, the girl brought the spear down into the ground, sticking it and turned to Bach, staring with eyes like molten steel.

Given the context of the situation, Bach became suddenly sure that he knew the girl from somewhere. This feeling persisted as she walked slowly to his throne, the surrounding creatures, both vampire and human staring now in fear and awe.

Then it came to him and he smiled as she approached and as she stepped up to him (Her face at level with his chest) She matched his smile. 


	3. the humble and cleansed

Chapter 1

The beginning

"What's your name girl." Bach asked conversationally. "I regret to say I don't think I ever learned it." Bach smiled his toothy grin, which was to say, he had more and sharper teeth then most vampires, his common trait was his shark like maw.

The girl frowned up at him and looked out the window to the rising sun. The sky was an orange gloom and the sun was about to make one of it's rare appearances in Nosgoths blotted sky. The girl seemed to look for it's coming eagerly and clenched the chair she sat in. A suicide wisher, Bach thought grudgingly. Fledglings had a terribly annoying habit sometimes of wishing for their own death.

"Your name girl." He said again and half walked, half glided across his quarters, and upstairs belfry to the Abbey that he had had cleared out so that it might be his own. She looked to him again, her eyes upturned and furious, he held a cup and as he approached her he set it down on the round card table next to her. It was filled with blood, as the girl recognized it, Bach saw that intense hunger in her eyes which only fledglings seemed to only be able to posess. Her face appeared both horrified and gleeful at the same time. A sound came out of her mouth that sounded between a hiss and a helpless squawk. Like the kind a human might make when you laced it's food with a little opium cocktail and then denied it after about a week (Which come to think of, Bach hadn't pulled that prank for a decade and the last time it had set him laughing right well, perhaps he might try it again.) The girl looked away violently and the glee in her voice turned to frustration as she spoke.

"I don't want it, take it away vampire and let me die, or kill me thyself. Whichever you would do, do it quickly or slowly as you wish, as long as you may get it done." Bach chuckled and mockingly shook his head at her lack of inthusiasem. "Such nonsense from such beauty," He chided "Such nonsense and such a terrible attitude for one who finds herself newly staring down the halls of eternity." Cynthia looked to him and to Bachs own alarm, he nearly stepped back, the girl's eyes burned with a hatred that he more associated with Kain then a new-born fledgling. He was beginning to doubt his desciseion to let this one live. "Eternal hell, you dead bastard!" She screamed. " Your lost in your eternal hell and you think it eternal life! How much longer can you mock yourself vampire! How much longer can you hold that heavy wo.. wool over you eyes…. Oh god! God No!!" 

The girl was burning, the sun had come out almost fully, it's top quarter already disappearing back into the clouds but it shined all the same and the girls fledgling flesh was sizzling, some of it seemingly evaporated into smoke, yet she did not burst into flames as was normal for fledglings who have there first taste of sunlight. Bach sneared, suddenly not likeing this girls unusually strong mettle and strong will. He briefly considered tearing her head and limbs off right before she exuded any more unpleasant strengths and decided not to. She still might be useful to him.

For a moment her hands flew off the chair as if she were prepared to leap out of it. But then they clamped back down. The sun was almost completely gone again and her pain past. Slowly she opened her eyes and this time when she caught sight of the cup, her mouth opened reflexively and the blood shot onto her face. She screamed despite her eagerness but even it was buried in the flow of blood as it dripped down her face into her mouth and rolled up her chin and on down her throat. When all the blood was gone, she made a few sobbing sounds and then shut her mouth up. Her gaze, now a dull hate that looked past Bach into some far away space.

Bach Smiled, and with a laughing cry, opened wide his mouth and gazed up at his high ceiling. From which half dead humans hung. Blood arched down from fresh wounds and arched bowl like into Bach's mouth. Bach laughed as it came down, knowing that The girl was no doubt in shear misery by now, such as that always made him smile. But though Cynthia's hunger did flare up unbaringly again, she did not look up even when her head turned upward, her gaze remained indifferent and hollow.

When Bach had his fill, he let the blood fall around him in a lined circle, a few of the retched human creatures above moaned while others mercifully died with happy hearts. Cynthia smiled her first true smile since her death, though pain still resided in it, she did smile.

"fledglings" Bach said exasporatedly, feeling exalted from the blood. He let out a triumphant cackling laugh that Cynthia didn't share, but understood.And with that understanding she knew that a part of her was corrupting. 

"My name…" She said under Bach's laugh, he went silent as she spoke a look of curiosity on his face. "My Name is Cynthia, that is my name and whatever passed as my former heritage is gone." She smiled again and hitched in a chuckle, still seeming far away.

"Well, Cynthia" Bach said, taking her chin in his clawed fist and lifting her eyes to his "if that is what you wish, so be it I suppose. It would not matter anyway, What does matter however, is this." He smiled, suddenly feeling old primal human lusts bubble within him. Cynthia was fair despite his memory of her humble beginnings, he could not look past that.

" What matters is that you are a direct brood of I, Bach, the warrior vampire and First Sargeant in Kain's Army. The eleventh of Raziel's first twelve brood and one of the four last remaining of those twelve." He cocked his head to the side, looking at her almost blank reation. He tried to delve into her mind and felt an immediate reaction, at first only a single thoughtMy god, he's in side ME!> Then a complete mental wall over her thoughts. Bach was beginning to find her strength unnerving. But his smile did not falter. "You know what that makes you, girl." 

"I am Cynthia" She shot back, "Address me as such" And with a deaft motion that not even Cynthia could react you, H gripped her skull and squeezed, feeling bone give way under his hold, he flung her back into the wall, where she made a small yelp. 

"As I was saying" Bach Continued "That makes you… nothing" He quickly approached her, intending on further proving his point to her through example, when he saw a blur to his right and a clawed delicate hand swipe at his face. Grunted a bit, then turned to see the girl standing defiantly even as her mangled face continued it's painful healing. (My god, she's strong.) Bach thought (I should have this one done with quickly before Raziel gets news of her, he'll want her to train. I should kill her right now.) 

Yet as he turned to face her and she bared her teeth in a hissing rage, he felt something that had been completely gone from his existence for years. Challenge, after all these years of crushing simple enemies, dealing with annoying traiters and groveling before horridly stuic eldergods. He found something that he could take in his hands like an acid clay and see what he might be able to make without burning himself too harshly. He had tried to do such before which other such as his brood, but alone in single hand combat they had simply been pathetic without a single shred of potential.

So the idea that for the first time in his brood he had actually encountered a true warrior made him prickle with excitement, almost giddeness.

"Good" He mumbled, feeling the almost healed scars on his face. "Very good." 

Bach walked slowly toward the girl, feeling her rage only when he attempted to probe her mind. She did not back down. Her back to the window, the suns fading rays shining through her hair, which was crisping slightly so that it looked like smoke came forth from her face in her rage. Bach would make her bow, he would brake her like a twig over his thumb before he made her ready for war. such was the way of the dead. 

"Quit thinking silly nonsense thoughts and come at me! Vampire bastard!" The girl shouted, Bach mouth and all his teeth gaped, so she could read his thoughts to then. What made this one of his broad so much stronger then.

The girl apparently lost interest in waiting and charged Bach, but the girl, no matter how powerful for her freshness, only gained a small advantage on Bach, causing him to back almost to the opposite wall of the room, then he clamped her face with his hand once more and simply indured as her teeth sank viciously into his palm. "By all the elders that ever were, girl." He retorted casually as her arms clamped around his forearm. "If it must be this way as always during our new relationship, I just might end it all here and be done with you without any trouble. For surely you would fall to even a lesser vampire with a charge such as that." Yet Bach doubted his hollow words as he squeezed on the girls skull, to the point where it broke. but yet he did not push it's shards into her brain. The girls arms began to flail and Bach's bravado returned, just another silly worm for him to play with. He dropped her laughing at it all, spreading his arms across the room and really the world.

"Yes young girl" He said laughing, "Oh, pardon my impertenance 'Cynthia, newly of the clan of Bach' but in any case, welcome to Nosgoth!." He walked over to the now dark window and stretched his arms even wider, seeming really to stretch them out longer "If the vampire hunters and demons do not kill you, the boredom will" He mockingly sighed, then snapped his fingers dramatically and two of his own guards walked into the room, good ol' Raziel strain as Kain liked to call it when he felt in the mood to irritate the other lutenants. " take her away," He said barely glancing away from the window. "Give her a quest, something mundane yet useful." A lantern seemed to go off in his head and bach turned around almost completely for all its importance. "assign her with Morsley, he's still dallying around his task to infilltrate that damned human camp a mile way Southsburg. Maybe I ought to just push up the deadline a little, so our little mistress may wet her beak with a little rebel blood" He turned back, impassively to his window. "Yes that't what she can do.

"No such thing," Cynthia gasped from her crushed skull "'GUH!' I shall do no suthch thing aak!" Bach looked down to see that her face was not healing so good the second time around and calmly qouted a simple phrase to the guards as one slung her over her shoulder. "Blood bath, let her lay for the night and awaken her upon the next night if she is not so already, now begone." Bach said no more, as the the guards walked away and he looked upon his dying house, he wondered if he could have picked a worse time to devide his attention between business and sport.

She slept, and dreamed, dreamed of hours passed, that had seemed to go by in an instant. The birth of her damnation, the loss of her soul through the death of the girl, the exilaration as she over-powered her vampire captors and the humiliation as Bach made to humble her. She dreamed of that and she dreamed of her father, her father, crying over her corpse in a flower field, tears leaking between his fingers and dripping onto her body, only Cynthia felt much was not right, for her body seemed largely whole and her father must surely have died in the burning woods after her flight, surely.

She dreamt that she walked forward toward him, in another body, her new fledgling vampire body, in a bright sunny field while the dafadyls whilted and bloomed in the eternal harsh wind.

"Father, Why do you cry so? She heard herself asking. Instantly the sobbing stopped and so did the tears, then one thick stream of blood ran down her fathers hand and he recite through his cold hands, for they seemed to go pale.

"Crying, who's crying, why should I cry when I have to and yet don't have to cry, isn't it funny, dear daughter thast as I cry and you die the world contiues to lie..."

He spoke in a jerky puntual manner that was mimed by the movements of his face and head and as he took his hands down, Cynnthia beheld a wide painful smiling grin and a pair of too large eyes which were a blood filmy red and he keep speaking, "Tell me daughter of your betrayal and your promise never to hurt man woman or child not of the vampire flesh and how you've died not in my arms but in shit and how you left me...".

Cynthia awoke harshly from the dream, but not as fast as she might have wished from such a dream. Her body arching and whipping around in the blood pools deep in the cellar basements of the church, the servant girls almost screamed as the new vampire in the court roared within the pool and splashed out the 'globins' that they had worked so hard to fill up as her body absorbed it. The servant boys nervously looked on at the feroscious naked beauty continued to wryth within the tub. Then her head darted foward and her eyes flew open and the little boys and girls running the bath began again to go about their business, leaving the poor vampire princess, as they had liked to call her, to herself. None yet knew that the title would doggidly hound her in her journeys.   
Cynthia arose from the pool, reflexively covering herself, for a moment, the blood continued to stain her body like a satin bed sheet, then it seemingly sank into her flesh, she looked around the narrow dark stone halls that she saw surround her and the pools like this one that seemed to have been dropped in any space large enough to hold them. She moaned when she looked down at what she bathed in and the content feeling inside her, that of the blood which had filled her. "Oh god, why?" She asked, stepping out of the tub and feeling the dingy stone floor against her toes, she looked over her surroundings again and spied a silver robe for which to cover herself hanging from a rusty nail. She touched it and longed to feel it's softness over her body, but as she ran her fingers through the thin guaze, she saw that it was almost completely translucent, which would not do for her. She looked upon some loose rags that were laying on the floor under the robe and snatched them up, smiling to herself. Initially she expected to find that the rags had been eaten through by rats, but they were still strong and sturdy. No rats here, she thought with a dark chuckle, I'm afraid the rats have probably felt the fledgling wrath long since before I came to be here.> She wrapped the cloth around her and looked to the pool as she bound the rag over her chest, feeling disgust at the almost immediate need that rose within her at its sight. Was the hunger really this strong, It was no wonder vampires often went insane after their fledgling life began. No wonder.   
She looked to and throw through the halls that stretched in every direction, her bearings were still instantly known to her but there seemed no end to the black hallways besides darkness, to the end, not even her increased vision could see through it.She began to go north when a voice from behind her echoed into the still dungeon.   
"Your going the wrong way, child." The voice said coyly "The exit to the baths lay in this direction." Cynthia turned to see a figure standing where nothing had been moments ago.Dressed in what seemed to be battle armor made of leather and thick wooden bands that covered the shoulders and chest, the figure smiled gamely at the fledgling girl and laughed, making the insignia cloth draped across his chest fall off his shoulder (What her father had liked to call, the Raziel Rag 'Beware the mark of Raziel girl' He had said, 'His kind are the worst of the dreaded scourge), the stranger absent-mindidly corrected it. "What's wrong girl, talk! Are you the one that fought so like twenty demons in Bach's courtyard hall. The two stepped casually closer and Cynthia held on to her rags like a Queen's cloak, ready to throw it in this ones face and pummel him if he wished to treat her so as Bach had.   
"I am Cynthia.." She said, then added "Of my own clan, a clan of one which will hold no others and will one day dominate, before it destroys it's self" She smiled and the figure laughed louder and hardier this time. "Clever girl!" He bellowed into the halls "Clever girl! Stupid maybe, but I haven't seen such as you for a long time, It will be a laugh to have to watch you fight, with such words as that on your lips." His smiled flickered away for a moment as they came within a foot of each other, Cynthia saw again to her annoyance that she only came up to this ones chest in height as she had with Bach. Were all old vampires such giants now? She had heard that vampires did change and evolve over time, but like as of this?   
He put his fist to his chest in salute and stated tersely. "I am Morsley, first warrior of the clan of Bach and loyal soldier in Lord master Kain's army. I am to walk you into battle in three days time." He took his fist down.   
"Must I go to battle so soon even if I were to go? For surely I have not been back in this world for yet but a few days. Can I not roam free for a night more or so to look upon the land and see what has happend in my absence." Cynthia relished the smile Morsley gave as he replied. "We will travel much land before we go into battle, if we go into battle, and you will see what is of the land. I must forewarn you though that as much that you will see, you will greive if it is the land that you love."   
She nodded solemly, almost smileing"I did, but I have lost much so that I think that I may cope." 


End file.
